“Genocide”: Elizabeth Warren Sounds Alarm About the War in Gaza

Senator Elizabeth Warren is warning that Israel’s devastating military campaign in Gaza, which has killed more than 33,000 people, could legally be considered a genocide.

Warren made the comments during an event last week at a Boston-area mosque. Video of her speech began circulating on social media on Monday. The death toll in Gaza, which includes at least 13,000 children, is considered a low estimate due to the difficulty in counting the dead.

“If you want to do it as an application of law, I believe that they’ll find that it is genocide, and they have ample evidence to do so,” Warren said, speaking at the Islamic Center of Boston in Wayland, Massachusetts. She was responding to an audience question about the International Court of Justice ruling that it was “plausible” Israel has committed acts of genocide in Gaza.

Warren noted that, for her, “it is far more important to say what Israel is doing is wrong. And it is wrong.”

“It is wrong to starve children within a civilian population in order to try to bend to your will. It is wrong to drop 2,000-pound bombs, in densely populated civilian areas,” she said.

Warren faced criticism for her stance on the war when she backed Israel after Hamas’s October 7 attacks. As Israel’s war ramped up, along with international criticism of its actions, protesters have shown up outside of Warren’s offices, as well as her home. One Palestinian American even confronted Warren at a restaurant in Cambridge, Massachusetts, in November. Warren also voted to send more military aid to Israel in February, part of a bill that defunded the U.N. Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees.

Warren’s new stance is the latest example of Democrats criticizing Israel’s actions. On March 22, Representative Alexandria Ocasio Cortez warned that the United States was complicit in the humanitarian crisis in the territory, and on March 15, Senator Chuck Schumer gave a speech criticizing Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s conduct in Gaza.

Warren was also among eight Democratic senators who called on President Joe Biden in an open letter in March to suspend military aid to Israel while it blocked U.S. humanitarian aid to Gaza.

More recently, the White House had to cancel its annual iftar banquet with American Muslim leaders last week after invitations were rejected in protest of America’s Israel military campaign. On Monday, the Foreign Press Association issued a statement urging international journalists to be allowed unfettered access into Gaza, which Israel’s government continues to block.